Rigveda: dravidian word oka, home

Thu May 13 17:56:25 UTC 1999

>Date: Thu, 13 May 1999 22:35:07 +0500
>To: kalyan97 at yahoo.com
>From: "Bh.Krishnamurti" <bhk at hd1.vsnl.net.in>
>Subject: Re: Rigveda: dravidian word oka, home
>In-Reply-To: <19990513044307.21637.rocketmail at web601.yahoomail.com>
>
>
>Dear Kalyanaraman:
>I agree with Prof. Witzel that Skt. o:kas- 'dwelling' is an IE word. Don't
forget that it is a long o: unlike Drav. short o; since there is no short o
in Skt. the spelling can be misleading.
>Ta. okkal 'relations' (DEDR 925) is derived from PD root *o 'to be
united', cf. Kur. okk- 'fit well' (DEDR 924). Burrow and Emeneau have been
very conservative in keeping meaning groups separate even if they have
transparent relationship. The other meanings like family, joint
agriculture, etc. derive from this root. There is a Telugu .sa.sthi:vibhkti
-yokka 'of, belonging to' which I traced to this root. Both Ta. and Ma. in
infinitive have o-kk-a. The Ko.dagu meaning fits this frame. The core
meaning is 'to be together, be united, etc.' and not a 'dwelling', etc. for
which we have *il, *wi:.du, etc. I do not know if Enlish  house is from the
same root. Skt. divaukasas- 'gods residing in diva-'. The Dravidian word
and the IE are different. One can always find accidental resemblances of
this kind. The Dravidian numeral one has three PD reconstructions, *on-_t-,
*o:r-/*or-V-, *okk-. I think they all go at a deeper level of derivation to
pre-Dravidian root *o 'to be united into one'. Regards,
>Bh.K.
>
>At 21:43 12/05/99 -0700, you wrote:
>>Sarasvati-Sindhu - http://sarasvati.simplenet.com
>>
>>Hi,
>>
>>It may be of interest to note that Dravidian
>>Etymological Dictionary of Burrow and Emeneau (DEDR)
>>cites oka as a Dravidian lexeme:
>>
>>DEDR 925: okkal, relations (Tamil); okl, family
>>(Kota);  okkal, residing, tenancy (Kannada); okkelu,
>>tenant (Tulu); wikil, family within a clan (Toda)
>>
>>If Prof. Witzel is right, maye, this entry should be
>>relegated to the appendix, as an IE etymon. Unless, of
>>course, the returning Indo-Iranians carried the
>>Dravidian substratum influence!
>>
>>It will be interesting to find cognates in Munda.
>>
>>Kalyanaraman
>>
>>--- Michael Witzel <witzel at fas.harvard.edu> wrote:
>>> Sarasvati-Sindhu - http://sarasvati.simplenet.com
>>>
>>> At 22:48 +0000 5/12/99, S.Kalyanaraman wrote:
>>> >
>>> >oka
>>> >m. (%{uc} Comm. on Un2. iv , 215) , a house ,
>>> refuge , asylum
>>>
>>> >okka
>>> >patrilineal joint family (Kod.agu);
>>>
>>> oka s- (neuter ) is the older Ved. form
>>> = E,Iran (Avestan) aocah-
>>>
>>> It has a perfectly good Indo-European etymology
>>> (*Heuk) ,  Ved. uc/oc 'to
>>> be used to, to find wellbeing, to dwell'  + -as
>>> (s-stem) ,
>>> see Mayerhofer, Etym. Dict. 1986-- p. 276 and 277 :
>>> cf. Lithuanian ukis
>>> 'farm house', etc.
>>>
>>> MW.
>>>
>>>
>>===========================================================================
>>> Michael Witzel                          Elect.
>>> Journ. of Vedic Studies
>>> Harvard University
>>> www1.shore.net/~india/ejvs
>>>
>>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> my direct line (also for messages) :  617- 496 2990
>>> home page:
>>> www.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/mwpage.htm
>>>
>>>
>>>
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